1. Technical Field
The present invention relates generally to an improved data processing system, and in particular to a method, system, and product for diagnosing and recovering from errors utilizing a data processing system's power subsystem. Still more particularly, the present invention relates to diagnosing and recovering from I/O subsystem errors utilizing a data processing system's power subsystem.
2. Description of Related Art
Many different types of errors may occur in a computer system. Some of these errors are difficult to diagnose and repair because the information that is stored in the computer system that would help in the diagnosis, such as the contents of certain registers, is inaccessible as a result of the error.
Input/output (I/O) adapter errors in particular may be difficult to diagnose without specialized debug software and may be difficult to recreate remotely at the manufacturer's site. I/O errors are difficult to diagnose due to the layout of the planars. There can be over ten PCI devices and it is nearly impossible to isolate a problem down to one adapter. In many cases, once one PCI device causes an error, it will cause several side effect errors from other PCI devices.
Currently, major bugs at a customer's site are difficult to debug. One current approach is to execute an operating system dump and hope to find and debug the problem back at the manufacturer's site.
In order to correctly diagnose an I/O error, the extended register information of the I/O chips is necessary. We must be able to gather the extended register information to diagnose the state of each device at the time of failure.
Therefore, a need exists for a method, system, and product for diagnosing and recovering from I/O subsystem errors utilizing a data processing system's power subsystem.